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The following evening Nic, who is in her 40s, decided to visit her GP neighbours because the pain had not subsided.

She said: "I was in a panic and in tears, they did a few tests and reassured me."

However, she said the pain in her kidneys was considerable and that she "had severe back pain."

"I was told by one friend that I was just being dramatic," Mrs Mitchell-Brown said.

So she took another antihistamine, despite medical suggestions to only take one per day, and rang 101.

An ambulance was eventually called out and arrived at 2.30am on the Sunday morning - with Mrs Mitchell-Brown still in agony.

Emergency responders told her she may have overdosed on antihistamine and that her kidneys were not functioning properly - they gave her some medication to help and advised her to drink plenty of water.

She added: "I would have gone to A&E but saw the post on Sunday that it was really busy and people should only attend if it was life threatning."

When she broke news of her plight online the reaction was mixed.

Where some offered advice and sympathy, others suggested the spider was harmless and not venomous.

She added: "I was told spiders don't normally bite, but hate being trapped - this one definitely gave me a really good biting.

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"This is the first day since being bitten that I've been able to stand up straight", Mrs Mitchell-Brown said on Wednesday.

"I'm about a 5 on the pain scale at the moment, it's gone down from an 8 on Saturday."

Professor Hart was brought into the debate when someone tagged him in Nic's post.

"I forwarded it to a leading arachnologist who identified it as a species of Eratigena a group of spiders that we commonly call 'house spiders' and which we tend to see quite a bit of this time of year," he saiud.

"They can bite but they are very docile and timid and seldom do.

"Their venom is not considered medically problematic for us. Bites may be a little painful but the venom does not cause any wider issues."

The Professor of Science Communication added: "Her tweet following up on this actually says she didn't see any spider bite her and just found this spider dead on the floor quite a bit later."